WWJD? Treat giving differently, that's what

Yeah, me too. For all the fuss we make about this gift-giving season, rarely do we recall what we received, or even what we gave.

But the important thing is that we gave. And got. And gave and got a lot.

Every year about this time, when I'm compiling a Christmas gift list that seems to grow annually, I get a twinge. It's what remains of my conscience, telling me that spending all this money to mark the birth of my Savior isn't the answer to WWJD.

This twinge of better judgment is easily silenced with a trip to the mall, but it's less likely I'll be able to shush my conscience this year. Not after I listened to a sermon delivered by Robert Grisham, 32, one of the pastors of the new Neighborhood Church.

Christmas should be a celebration of Jesus' birth, but it long ago morphed into this gluttonous consumption of things, Grisham says.

Take Friday, Black Friday -- the day after Thanksgiving when holiday sales begin in earnest.

On that day, Grisham says, we &quot;get up earlier than God to go to Best Buy or Toys R Us to get the latest gadget and toy on sale ... Maybe you get to see a fight break out at Wal-Mart over a $30 DVD player.&quot;

And when Christmas Day is done, you're left with this weird feeling, Grisham says, &quot;like, 'God, there's got to be more to what I just experienced.' &quot;

And there is. There can be. &quot;Christmas was meant to change the world,&quot; reads a mailer that Grisham's church, born in September, sent out to Midtown residents. That bold claim of global transformation couldn't be made today.

Unless you join the conspiracy.

It's the Advent Conspiracy, a movement that grew from five churches last year to more than 500 this year. It's the commitment to do Christmas differently. With a focus on the divine, not discounts.

The Web site adventconspiracy.org says it begins &quot;with us resisting a culture that tells us what to buy, wear and spend with no regard to bringing glory to Jesus.&quot;

The conspiracy, as Grisham explains it, has three steps.

Slow down and spend less. We say Jesus is the reason for the season, but we know Christmas today is, at its core, consumerism.

Give relational gifts. Your list is long, Grisham says, and your money not quite as long, so you end up giving cheapo gifts. The worst offender: gift cards. &quot;How less relational can you get?&quot; Grisham says.

One year, I bought my mom a gorgeous green cashmere sweater -- one that moths got to before she could wear it. A hundred bucks wasted.

A few years ago, I made calendars using family photos. I can't recall how she reacted when she got that cashmere sweater, but when she unwrapped the calendar, her face lit up. A well-spent $15.

Advent Conspiracy offers all sorts of gift ideas: A promise to babysit. A recipe book of your favorites. Heck, make some peanut brittle. Just make it personal.

The money you save by giving relationally, give it away. Redistribute the wealth. Sounds radical, but it's also Biblical. Read 2 Corinthians 8:9: &quot;For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that you through his poverty might become rich.&quot;

If we follow God's example of sacrificial giving, &quot;we come back to the real meaning of Christmas,&quot; Grisham says.

Seventy-five percent of the Neighborhood Church's December and January offering will go toward meeting needs locally, and the rest will go to global clean water initiatives.

Close to 4,000 children die every day because of water-borne diseases. It would take $10 billion -- less than 3 percent of the $450 billion we spend on Christmas annually -- to provide clean drinking water for everyone on the planet.

Christmas was meant to change the world -- and it still could, if we want it to.